Posted on 10/26/2001 9:08:52 AM PDT by 74dodgedart
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon (news - web sites) cast a wide net on Thursday for bright ideas on thwarting terrorism, seeking to pick the brains of just about everyone from tinkerers in their garages to big corporations worldwide.
The Defense Department said it was seeking help in ''defeating difficult targets, conducting protracted operations in remote areas and developing countermeasures to weapons of mass destruction.''
The goal is to find concepts that could be developed and fielded in 12 to 18 months, much faster than normal Pentagon purchasing and deployment timetables.
U.S. officials from President Bush (news - web sites) down have said they fear more terrorist attacks after the Sept. 11 hijack attacks that killed more than 5,000 people at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and on a crashed flight in Pennsylvania.
Laying out an unusually straightforward, three-step process for entering the competition, the Pentagon called for one-page concept descriptions by Dec. 23. Those retained will be asked to provide up to 12 pages of details in a second phase.
The department then would invite those with the most promising ideas to submit full proposals ``that may form the basis for a contract,'' the statement said.
``We're open to ideas from just about everybody,'' added Glenn Flood, a Pentagon spokesman. More information on the process has been posted at http://www.bids.tswg.gov/.
Jacques Gansler, who served as the Pentagon's acquisition chief under former President Bill Clinton, said similar approaches had worked well for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon's chief research and development arm.
``The beauty of it is you can get a broad range of people thinking out of the box,'' he said. ``Often you'll get ideas from inventors'' as well as from big defense contractors.
Generally, the Defense Department spells out, often in excruciating detail, what it wants to buy when it solicits bids for a project.
In throwing a competition wide open without spelling out what it had in mind, the Defense Department was hoping to unleash creative solutions to old problems typically handled in less innovative ways, he said.
``They're saying, 'I've got a problem. Help me solve it','' said Gansler, now at the University of Maryland School of Public Affairs.
Let Saddam sort it all out for US
I still like feeding them naked and alive to hungry pigs, maybe some of those European wild boars that have become such a nuisance in Germany lately. You'd have to get a big pack of the pigs and get them mean and hungry. You might have to slash the Taliban guys non-lethally to get the blood smell going.
You could make a stadium event out of it in true Taliban tradition.
The Pentagon (news - web sites) cast a wide net on Thursday for bright ideas on thwarting terrorism, seeking to pick the brains of just about everyone from tinkerers in their garages to big corporations worldwide.
Well, nice to see that they had this whole thing planned out. Sounds like the kind of hare-brained scheme we would find under Clinton.
(Nothing wrong with plumbers or shoe shine boys per se. It is just they can't run a country. Yet as is becoming obvious=NEITHER CAN OUR POLITICIANS!)
Increase surveillance on American citizens, require them to bear a tattoo on their forearm so we know the sheep from the wolves, and keep lax visa restrictions on people coming to the US from the Middle East.
Yep. That makes lots of sense to me.
I din't see in request for proposals that they were looking for PC answers.
where did you read that?
I think most us common folks suggestions for the pentagon, would be VERY un-PC
so unless you know something we don't - try constructive criticism
Regards,
Lurking'
It's the size of Texas.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.